My breath is hardening, the obituary in her voice
fills me. Honesty of glass: dilated skin just
beyond touch, or what was meant by my
third dead lung. It seems, I’m outliving. It seems
he’s pressing a hand against me into the small
of her back. What’s my shade? My voice
made up of smoke she’s exhaling. Little vessel
flamed by smoke in its own shape: my called-to
litmus trying to lie even as it hits oxygen, even
as the dream of an eye is still what’s trying.
As though it would
one day keep your teeth
clean, dawn trimmed
at its dew point, my skeleton
bent back, everything
about me was a warranty.
Dusk’s point of lucidity
went floating into view
on buckling cellophane.
Every move I made
was a correction, a turning
away from my own
point of view. The current
was unwinding. Then,
light shimmied into frame,
and I blew a flame
onto the wick. I turned
away from the field
where your cage is buried.
